Conventional insurance businesses traditionally grow from providing one type of insurance (e.g. auto insurance) to providing several differing types simultaneously. This pattern generally results in incorporating a new set of information and data management. Additionally, each type of insurance often has its own specialized software and computer interface for accessing data, or as the enterprise expands into new insurance businesses it develops new software and interfaces for the new business.
Therefore, insurance companies that offer personal and commercial lines of insurance have relied on a variety of separate and distinct proprietary software applications that support various administrative functions for each line of insurance. Typically, each application provides features and functionality that support business operations such as billing, collections, policy administration, claims, and reinsurance administration for disparate lines of insurance. Although the applications have been available for many years and offer a variety of sophisticated features and functionality, the applications are developed and enhanced separately and therefore, have few, if any, features and functionality in common. More importantly, the applications typically do not use the same databases and in some cases, may not have access to the same data. If data across applications is not updated appropriately, employees using the applications risk accessing outdated or inaccurate data when providing assistance and services to agents and/or policy customers.
The use of separate and distinct proprietary applications within an insurance company is inefficient and ineffective for the company's employees as well as the company's agents and customers. In addition to data consistency problems, employees that manage a variety of tasks for the different lines of insurance are often required to switch between applications to complete the tasks. Each application may have an entirely different user interface as well as work flow management model. Users are required either to become proficient with each application or if time and resources do not permit, limit their use to fewer applications. As a result, one employee may not have the expertise to follow a task to completion and may be required to transfer responsibility for completing a task to another employee more familiar with the application needed to complete the task. If employees are required either to learn and switch between multiple applications or to transfer responsibility to other employees based on their application expertise, time and resources that could be devoted to servicing agents and customers may otherwise be devoted to activities associated with using separate and distinct proprietary applications.
There is a need for a computerized insurance administration system and method that supports user configuration of modules providing functionality for a plurality of insurance administration operations. There is a need for a computerized insurance administration suite that supports user configuration of modules for use across a plurality of insurance business functions and lines. There is a need for an integrated insurance administration suite that supports insurance workflow management by allowing a user to configure modules to meet the needs of an insurance carrier. There is a need for an enterprise-based semantic model for linking and accessing data across enterprise-defined lines of business.